The great revolution of thought that is going on has called forth this vigour. The China of yesterday was _fainéant_ and unprogressive. The China that is emerging out of this revolution of thought is energetic, though possibly unpractical. The old traditions of Government are not lost, and they wait but for the man and the hour to enable China to act as vigorously as she has done in time past. Her action in this opium question may be ill-considered in some details; it may even fail; but it has shown the world that China is in earnest, and that she can act with a vigour which will cause wonder and envy on this side of the world. Every missionary reports that even high officials are coming asking to be cured of the opium habit. The missionaries have founded refuges where they receive and cure those who are ready to submit to the terrible ordeal, for their suffering is intense. Many quack cures are advertised. Some are definitely pernicious; for instance, the {120} morphia syringe has become a common article for sale in some parts of China. Some few may be beneficial. There is no doubt that the movement against opium is a great national movement, and is not the result of the action of any small or fanatical party. What China has done proves that this is so. Let me close the chapter by a quotation from the ablest of the foreign representatives at Peking, Sir John Jordan. Writing to Sir Edward Grey, he says: "It is true that the Chinese Government have in recent years effected some far-reaching changes, of which the abolition of the old examination system is perhaps the most striking instance; but to sweep away in a decade habits which have been the growth of at least a century, and which have gained a firm hold upon 8,000,000 of the adult population of the empire, is a task which has, I imagine, been rarely attempted with success in the course of history; and the attempt, it must be remembered, is to be made at a time when the Central Government has largely lost the power to impose its will upon the provinces. The authors of the movement are, however, confident of success, and China will deserve and doubtless receive much sympathy in any serious effort she may make to stamp out the evil." {121} CHAPTER X THE WOMEN'S QUESTION